By The Way
by chi-of-ink
Summary: one-shot, fem!Allen. Cross's womanizing attitude may have left a darker impression on his apprentice than he realized.. -.no pairings.-


**Obviously not intended as possible canon. Typed up while thinking of Cross's impression on Allen, and impacts left on younger generations by adults in general. Female!Allen because that's the way it turned out.**

**Obviously not intended as possible canon...stop lecturing me on canon and believably as compared to canon. I'm aware of canon. I'm beginning to get irritated by having these things pointed out to me.**

**Please enjoy anyway. *sadness***

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By The Way...

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Allen was fifteen years old and not thinking about his looks. He wasn't like anything normal anyway - normal looking or normal _living_ - so he didn't stress about the core of things.

The unimportant core of things.

Living with the Master was a battle on it's own. Allen was cute and boyish, with features so bold and strange that it wasn't hard to believe he had been cursed. He only looked fifteen from the front (because he was growing fast now, fifteen years old with wide, blue-gray eyes.) Master drank and tipped his wine glass about lazily as he spoke. Timcampy, looming twice the size of Cross's hat, sat with content obedience on his Master's covered head. The gold tail that trailed down lay prettily against Cross's red hair.

He drank a lot. He was a irritable, one-minded sort of drunk. Not the kind that would seek Allen out, but the kind that would indulge in whatever came to mind and not think twice about it. There was always a white cigerette hanging from his mouth, leaving trails of twisting gray smoke thinning in curls around the ceiling.

Allen saw a lot of different women on his arms. Some of them were the elegant, purchased kind, smug and silky with half-lidded eyes. There were giggly ones - Allen always thought those were drunk, too. He couldn't really set the smells apart enough to tell how much was the Master's wine and how much was rosemary perfume. It all mixed together in that dizzy way the always kept Allen in his room, reading or thinking or just being personally bothered by the sound of ladies giggling and gasping and Cross's low, low voice as he picked one up and set her on his lap and rocked up close to her - more giggling, giggling - Allen always felt sick if he listened to that for too long.

Maybe that was just personal.

The birth certificate marked Allen Walker as a 'she.'

Which felt like a stupid additional explanation on his part. It didn't matter a whole lot. The Master didn't really care that Allen was supposed to be regarding himself as 'herself' and 'she' and 'my' in the higher kind of voice that Cross's girls - Cross's giggling girls - always seemed to use. Allen like the boyish looks he ended up with. Master cared about calling out Allen's intended gender about as much as Allen did - which wasn't very much.

Allen wasn't exactly sitting there listening in when Cross was holding girls on his arms. He didn't really need to go confirm anything. His bedroom smelled like sex enough for the picture to be clear - Allen didn't really go in there a lot because there really wasn't any reason to, but when he did pass by he tried not to think of the prostitute-figures walking in, wearing clothes Allen would never wear. It felt shameful, stockings and bodices and all that. Allen had a straight-lined shirt, and black pants, and the neat ties for "Master's student's looks"... and he didn't really care that his body was curved more than some other boy's, it's not like he ever looked at it anyway.

Allen had two or three undershirts to fit the curve of 'his' chest, and they were small anyway. And panties, but they were plain, too. He knew why he didn't really like them either, why he never called himself 'she' and tossed that aside. Because it didn't matter if he was a girl - he was still cursed. His body was still cursed. He didn't really like his body, honestly. And a normal girl - well, Master's normal girls - they were whores. Dolled-up whores. Allen wasn't going to wear a the skirts that they wore, just because they would _fit._

It wasn't that he wanted to be a boy. It was just that - from his position - it was easier. Easier to fight. And he liked his face with the boyish cut. And he liked not worrying about any of those things others would have worried over, like meeting people and looking pretty. And watching faces, looking into eyes.

He met Rinali, who cocked her head curiously as she showed him to his room. She called him 'he' without questioning why. It didn't come up until later, and Allen was grateful for that, because he thought about her skirt and her boots for a long time after. He blushed at her face - she was just so cute. He hoped dearly that she didn't start fretting about finding him clothes, but she never did.

Rinali's legs were tucked under her as she talked - he noticed her hands in loose fists on her lap. At last she asked him, very carefully, why he wanted to be called 'he.' "You're really pretty, Allen." she said. "If you don't mind me saying that. As a girl...I think you're cute..."

The great thing about being unusual in their alliance was that Exorcists didn't dwell on their strangeness with each other too much, either. They were all odd people. Allen's strangeness was almost commonplace.

Rinali hugged him around the shoulders and kissed his cheek when he didn't answer. Her smile wasn't the sort of heartbreaking, lonely thing he was dreading, and Allen was relieved.

Rabi's face tinged pink a few times when Allen gave him a short look, but he didn't stumbled and stutter. He draped his arm around Allen's shoulder easily, like it didn't matter much. His touch was warm, and sometimes Allen hated that he couldn't just suck it up and try on a skirt for once.

Nobody called Allen 'she.'

That's what Allen was, though.

Fifteen years old, female, five-six. A virgin, too.

Not that it mattered a lot.

He was cursed, body and soul - all over. Not even Allen wanted to sit there and look at the heavy outlines of his body. He liked his arm and his eye in the way that they were a bold reminder. The slight curve of breasts didn't really state anything, they weren't survivor markings or Innocence. They were just breasts, stupid breasts. They were young, worthless versions of those things the Master liked groping on his women so much - Allen bet himself he couldn't make those weird gasp-y sounds if he tried...

Even though Linali's cheeks went red when he complimented her sometimes, and that's where her eyes always went too afterward - to his chest. He wasn't much of a figure compared to her, but she still found moments to sneak looks at him. And Rabi's heartbeat thudded heavy against him sometimes when he steadied Allen's shoulders after a fight. Rabi was silly though, and he never looked at him in the lovesick way he would with those pretty stranger girls.

Allen did his job. He wanted to save, to keep promises, to not be led away. So...

So.

Timcampy was tiny without the Master there to cuddle with. He sat on Allen's finger lightly. The little cross symbol tilted up at him, studying his face. Allen never saw as much emotion on Timcampy's little cross-design, of course, but he could kind of _feel_ how the little gollum might be thinking. Maybe that's just because he grew up seeing Timcampy perched by his master so much. He was kind of attached to that neutral form, and the long, weightless wings.

Timcampy missed the Master a lot. Allen knew that.

Allen kind of missed him too.

Sometimes he let himself wonder if he could stay in the house with him and be brave and wear something feminine without feeling like he was trying to become something dirty. Rinali wasn't dirty, and she was beautiful looking - more beautiful than Cross's women. Allen felt stupid thinking of how he might look in one of Rinali's skirts. One of her longer skirts, even. Allen had never worn a skirt before.

Timcampy nuzzled his hand lightly. Allen smiled lightly and straightened a little in his seat.

Maybe someday - just to prove he could... Allen almost laughed, beginning to feel sick again. Master might mock him. That wouldn't be surprising.

Allen thought he'd make a terrible girl, too.


End file.
